Well, while getting over my wisdom teeth being removed, I finally got around to removing Vista from my laptop and installing the latest version of Ubuntu, called Karmic Koala. And I have to say, I'm lovin' it.

And let me be clear - I friggin' hate change when it comes to my operating systems. Even small changes shit me to tears.

I was worried about the learning curve, about install issues, all that sort of stuff. And while I'm still slowly setting it up, there have been very few issues. It doesn't like the .cr2 file format I take photos in, for instance, but it would appear there are work arounds, I just have to implement them. And if I'm not happy with them, I can use Wine to run the Windows versions I'm used to.

What I think I like most is, when I try to do something new that requires additional files to make it work, it lets me select them and and install them. Anything being downloaded onto the computer is coming in specifically because I need it to do the thing I want to do. I don't have anything being installed that I don't know about, unlike the endless Microsoft upgrades.

Also, I've opened a handful of Microsoft .docs, etc. and they have all run without a problem. That's very handy indeed.

I have a fair few friends running Ubuntu, and I know there are others out there, like me, a bit worried about changing over. But I've found the process significantly less painful than the one I go through whenever upgrading to the next version of Windows. With the bonus that my laptop has never run better. It came pre-installed with Vista and has run like a duck in leg-irons since day one.

At the moment I'm keeping Vista on my main computer (also pre-installed), but I'm already getting seriously tempted to get rid of it.

It's just so nice to have a clean, simple operating system. Especially one that I haven't had to pay hundreds to the company for, only to have the privilege of effectively becoming a beta tester.